See, this is why we don’t pull apart “crackers” on Christmas in the U.S.—a New Zealand woman found a dead, partially decomposed mouse in hers earlier this week during her family’s Christmas celebration. “I had said to my granddaughter ‘what’s the smell’ and we couldn’t work it out until we pulled the cracker.” Then: Merry Christmas! There’s a dead mouse in yer lap! “It ruined my appetite for the rest of the day,” she told her local paper.

Kiplinger set itself three basic rules to follow for affordable holiday entertaining: “make it a team effort” by splitting hosting duties or having guests bring food, “borrow what you don’t have,” and ” be creative.” Following these rules, they came up with ten ideas for holiday get-togethers that even people on tight budgets can pull off. Here are the first three.